


Hope or Desperation?

by mamazelena



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Fix It Fic, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-24
Updated: 2015-03-24
Packaged: 2018-03-19 10:55:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3607506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mamazelena/pseuds/mamazelena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ever since Ursula left, Cruella takes nighttime trips down to the beach in Storybrooke and watches the water, gin in hand. She drinks, she cries, and she waits. Most of all, she dares to hope.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hope or Desperation?

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by karlimeaghan on Tumblr and her Sea Devil AU gifset: http://karlimeaghan.tumblr.com/post/114444877834/sea-devil-au-every-day-since-ursula-left-cruella
> 
> Also helped along by Florence and the Machine's song "Swimming".

Ever since Ursula had found her Happy Ending, had just up and left, Cruella had had the need to go down to the beach - especially at night. Ursula had loved the waters at night - and wait.

Closing the door to the Panther with a little more force than usual, she strode down the docks to the sand, kicking her shoes off and leaving them on the edge as she stepped barefoot down to the water. 

Gin in hand, she uncapped it and took a swig, trying to ignore the burning in her eyes and the pulsing ache in her chest that the smell of seawater brought her every time she ventured down. Ursula had always smelled of seawater, even in this realm. It stuck to her and had burned itself into Cruella's brain.

She took to strolling down the beach, feeling the grainy sand between her toes as she stared out into the water, occasionally raising the bottle to her lips. 'Maybe you deserve this', her mind supplied, 'Maybe this is payback for her to leave without even a goodbye, since you did the same thing before', it said again, and she merely squeezed her eyes shut and took another swig from the bottle clutched so tightly in her hand. Maybe it was, she didn't know, but she was in too much pain to even think about that. 

Tears began sliding down her cheeks, hot and mixing with her makeup to become a shade of grey, and she let out gasps of breath as she kept walking, raising the bottle to her lips again and drinking until her lungs burned. It wasn't hard for her to pinpoint exactly what had made her cry, but a small part of her brain chose to believe that it was because of the freezing winds and the sea mist hitting her face. 

Her body shook, both from the cold and her emotions, as she continued walking along the water. The fur draped around her torso did very little to help fend off the biting cold of Storybrooke, Maine, but she couldn't bring herself to really care about how cold she was. She'd been doing this same thing for days, she still couldn't pinpoint whether she was hopeful or desperate - maybe both? - but she kept coming back. She kept staring into the waters, walking along the sand until she fell over. She kept waiting.

Just as she moved to take another step, her legs shook and gave out, and she landed on her side in the sand and sloshed gin down her front, quickly shutting her eyes at the sand that flew up into her face. She laid there for a while, shaking as her tears still fell and the seawater lapped at her feet. It felt almost like a caress, the water, and that only succeeded in making her cry harder, sobs ripping from her chest as she laid there in the sand.

\----

It was a while before she pushed herself up to move again, merely crawling slowly up the beach, far enough that the water couldn't touch her again. She took in shaking breaths as she pulled her legs to her chest, wrapping her free arm around them as she took to staring at the sea again, watching the waves crash and lap at the beach it could reach. 

Her arm moved from around her legs after a while, her shaking fingers swiping at the tears on her cheeks and smudging her already ruined makeup. She knew she must've looked a mess, but she couldn't care about that. Not now. She was alone now, anyway, both literally and emotionally. In the weeks she'd been doing this, she'd discovered that no one in the town ever visited the water at night. She was safe from questioning, safe from onlookers who judged. The people in this shabby little town took to judging and gossip more than she ever had, even though she had judged their horrible fashion tastes before. She didn't do very much of anything anymore, aside from drinking and putting in the tiniest effort to find whatever she thought her Happy Ending could be now. She doubted it'd be anything she would be truly happy with - much like how she'd thought that material things could make her truly happy before - now that Ursula was gone back to the sea.

\----

Hours passed, and Cruella ended up dozing right there in her curled up position on the beach, jolting awake with every hard crash of the waves. When that did happen, she took a drink from the bottle beside her, and closed her eyes again. 

She opened her eyes again, around the twentieth time the waves scared her awake, and sighed, taking a few gulps of gin and wiping at her tired eyes. She could sleep in bed later, after she ran out of gin. The night of waiting always ended when she ran out of her drink. Sometimes it took her until daylight, sometimes it ended when the moon was still high in the dark sky. 

Blinking tiredly, she stared out at the dark waves, swallowing thickly and licking her lips. She didn't know if she had any tears left to cry. She doubted the gin was helping much, either, but that was her security blanket. She'd always had gin, even though it usually caused the majority of her problems. That, and her snappy remarks. She could never seem to help herself from making a snarky comment.

Just then, she heard something else in the water, and it didn't sound like normal waves. She scrambled to her feet, rushing down to be a little closer to the waves, her heart hammering in her chest. She felt her eyes burn with tears again, but a glimmer of hope had settled in her chest. Her wide eyes scanned the water for anything that could've been what she'd heard, her breath caught in her throat.

Two tentacles shot out of the water, wrapping themselves around her ankles and dragging her forward and into the sea.

Cruella grinned at noticing the tentacles, forcing out a broken "Ursula!" before she screamed, kicking and flailing as she met the water.

"I can't sw--" she said in a panic, not even able to finish the last word before her mouth filled with water.

Ursula moved to pop up out of the water, pulling her up and watching her in worry. She'd thought Cruella had been more ready than that.

Cruella coughed, spitting water out of her mouth and leveling her with a slight glare, "And this coat is dry clean only!" she snapped, even though she hardly even meant the anger. 

Ursula merely gave her a look, her tentacles wrapping around her as well as she moved a hand to wash the makeup from her face, sighing internally. She looked like hell. 

"Get Mal to fix it. And did you really think I'd let you drown?" came her reply, rolling her eyes. "Now shut up and kiss me," she told her, smirking slightly and merely hugging her closer.

Cruella gave a watery laugh, draping her arms around her neck and pressing a hard kiss to her lips, neither of them noticing the rainbow glow that rippled away from them. She pulled back, merely pressing her face against her neck, "I took a card from the heroes, darling, I hoped. I hoped you'd come back for me," she admitted, sniffling and pressing loving kisses against her neck. 

"I thought I'd had my Happy Ending, you know. I thought my singing voice, my father, I thought that was it. I didn't know why I'd started feeling so empty after a while, and why the only things I felt like singing were sad ballads," Ursula began, starting to move out of the water and carry Cruella with her, "Until I realized it was because I was missing you. My singing voice, my father? That's only part of my Happy Ending. You're the rest," she told her, now standing on two legs and hoisting her up into her arms. 

She walked to where Cruella had left the gin bottle, using a tentacle to snatch it up and toss it into a nearby trashcan. There wasn't much left of it, anyway. She grabbed her shoes with that same tentacle, carting both those and Cruella to where she spied the Panther. She used her tentacles to pull open the doors, laying Cruella in the passenger's side seat and clipping the seatbelt around her. She settled in the driver's seat and shut the doors, twisting the keys and starting the engine.

It was only after they'd started driving that Cruella spoke again, turning her head and sniffling, "I'm your Happy Ending?" she asked, blinking back another wave of tears. 

"A part of it, yes. I don't know how everything is going to work, since I know Daddy won't like coming on land to see me, but I'll figure it out," she said, before shaking her head, "That's not the most important thing now. The most important thing," she said, giving her a look, "is getting you home and as warm as possible. You're probably going to catch pneumonia, you know, and it's all because you had to hope," she told her seriously, even though she couldn't help but grin at how warm that made her feel inside.

The last thing they heard as they sped down the road toward Rumpelstiltskin's cabin, was Cruella's laughter.


End file.
